


let’s face it, hon (we were doomed from the start)

by zimnokurw



Series: rest your head upon my shoulder [1]
Category: Chicago Med
Genre: (except for connor passing out but then he's good), (kind of), Bi Connor Rhodes, Boys In Love, Boys Kissing, Did I mention fluff?, Established Relationship, Fluff, Gay Will Halstead, Hospital, Jealous Will, Low Blood Sugar, M/M, Marriage Proposal, Orange juice - Freeform, Passing Out, Rhodestead - Freeform, Secret Relationship, Sickfic, Tooth-Rotting Fluff, blink and u'll miss it, concerned Will, hurt Connor, i created my own timeline, in an on-call room, it's just really happy fic, loss of consciousness, maggie ethan and april are here for a second, mentions of others - Freeform, nothing bad happens, so that's romantic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-11
Updated: 2020-04-11
Packaged: 2021-03-01 21:02:26
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,127
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23593528
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/zimnokurw/pseuds/zimnokurw
Summary: How did Connor go from passing out in the ED to proposing to Will in an on-call room.
Relationships: Will Halstead & Connor Rhodes (Chicago Med), Will Halstead/Connor Rhodes (Chicago Med)
Series: rest your head upon my shoulder [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1698292
Comments: 8
Kudos: 148





	let’s face it, hon (we were doomed from the start)

**Author's Note:**

> First of all, Rhodestead deserves better and Rhodestead deserves more fics. Second of all, I miss Connor. 
> 
> This fic does not fit anywhere in the canon, because I created my own canon, becAUSE I CAN.

* * *

It wasn’t the most busy day, but the ED was short-staffed due to medical conference in New York, so they called down Dr. Rhodes for help.

He haven’t gotten much sleep last night, his own fault. And he was after three surgeries already. The first one, scheduled lungs transplant, went as smoothly as you would expect a transplantation to go. The second one, heart valve replacement. There was no blood clotting and no other issues and Connor was finished in less than 3 hours. The third one surgery though, this was an emergency. Guy in his twenties stabbed with a knife. There were some complications, because he lost a lot of blood before the ambulance got to him. They were able to save him, but he’s got some resting to do first.

Connor didn’t have much time to sit down between that and admitting patients in ED. On the top of that, he was running on the sandwich he ate in the car on his way to the hospital and two cups of coffee. One he stole from Robyn (it was disgusting, by the way, because she didn’t add any sugar and Connor didn’t have time for that) and one he got from Dr. Halstead.

To say he was tired was an understatement. He saw the looks Dr. Halstead was sending him, after he got a little dizzy, but said that he was fine. He was thinking about twenty minutes break, just crashing in some not used room, but Maggie yelled out “Dr. Rhodes, treatment 2!”, so he just jumped in, running to the paramedics and seeing that Nurse Monique and Dr. Halstead were joining him.

It was nothing too severe though. 9 year old boy, Justin, with an allergic reaction, because he forgot he had an allergy and just wanted to eat the cookie. His mom didn’t have his shots with them, so she called the ambulance and they took him to the hospital.

* * *

“Thank you again, Doctors.” the mother, Ms. Jones, smiles genuinely at Dr. Rhodes and Dr. Halstead, so Connor nods and smiles back.

“Our pleasure.” answers Will.

“Just hang in there, champ.” Connor says to the boy, and when Justin nods to him with a smile, he turns to leave. In the corner of his eye he sees Dr. Halstead looking at him, so he lifts his eyes at the man as they are walking out of the treatment two. He must’ve moved his head too fast, though, because suddenly his vision becomes blurry and he gets dizzy again, feeling like the floor disappears from under his feet.

He knows that there’s Will standing a feet away from him and that April just walked out of Baghdad with Dr. Choi by her side, and that there’s Maggie and Ms. Goodwin talking at the nurse’s station, but in that moment he feels like they are all separated from him by some kind of cloud. His medical mind is telling him that he’s about to lose consciousness and that it’s a bad thing, but he’s not really thinking straight anymore and he is so goddamn tired, so he doesn’t even know when he falls asleep, (was it before or after he closed his eyes?) but he does.

* * *

Will can clearly see that Dr. Rhodes isn’t feeling too good. He’s not really surprised, with an hour and a half of sleep, lack of proper meal, three surgeries and about a dozen patients in ED. So he wants to talk to Connor, convince him to go home or at least take a break to eat and nap. He’s about to take him to the break room to talk, right after the talk with mother of the boy with allergic reaction, but when he looks at Dr. Rhodes, he just sees him close his eyes as if he doesn’t even have control over his eyelids anymore and he sees his knees give up.

“Connor!” he yells out seeing the man collapse to the floor and there’s an ‘Oh god!’ from Ms. Jones, because Connor collapses right in front of the treatment 2.

Will breaks into a run and his hands are all over the older doctor in a second. “Choi, a little help here!” he shouts, because he won’t be able to lift Connor on his own. He presses two fingers to the man’s neck, there’s a pulse, that’s good.

“Take treatment 3!” Maggie shouts number of the closest empty bay, and by that time Dr. Choi is next to Will.

April sets spinal board on the ground, so they could transport Dr. Rhodes to the bed carefully. All three of them lies him safely on the board. “On my count.” Will starts when he sees that him and Dr. Choi are ready to lift Connor up. “One, two, three!”

* * *

When Connor wakes up, he blinks a few times to adjust his eyes to the brightness in the room.

“Dr. Halstead, Ms. Goodwin, he’s up.” he hears one of the nurses and just that makes him want to go back to sleep.

He lifts his left hand to rub his face and wake himself up a little more by that, but before he can do that, there’s someone else’s palm on his forearm. Male, he holds Connor’s hand down, pinned to the bed. Oh, that’s Will, definitely.

Connor opens his eyes fully and looks in front of himself. There’s Ms. Goodwin, looking at him, checking his condition. And there’s Dr. Halstead, his palm still on Connor’s forearm, not that he minds, staring at the monitor with Rhodes’ vitals. Only then, Connor notices that he has an IV in his arm and there’s almost empty drip next to the bed.

“You gave me drugs?” he asks offended.

“Just some fluids, calm down.” dismisses him Dr. Halstead and he finally looks at him. “Your EKG and BP are normal.” he says.

“Because I’m fine.” answers Dr. Rhodes and then he turns to Ms. Goodwin with a sweet smile. She likes him, definitely likes him more than she likes Halstead so he needs her on his side. “I just passed out, but you gave me an energy drip, and thank you very much for that by the way, but now I’m good to get back to work.”

“Connor, you lost consciousness and collapsed to the floor!” Dr. Halstead bursts out, taking his hand away from Connor.

“It’s Dr. Rhodes for you.” Connor deadpans.

“Well, _Dr. Rhodes_.” Dr. Halstead begins, emphasising his two last words. “You lost consciousness and collapsed to the floor.” he grits through his teeth and turns to Ms. Goodwin. “He is not fine. I think what we’re looking at is a-“

“Vasovagal syncope.” Dr. Rhodes jumps in, his voice sounds bored. “Probably low blood sugar, I’m gonna grab some protein bar and I’m gonna be fine.”

“I would like to run a few tests, Ma’am. Just to be safe.” Dr. Halstead says to Ms. Goodwin, ignoring his patient.

“Well, it’s the patient’s decision.” the woman answers. “Are you sure you’re alright?” she asks Connor, watching him with concern in her eyes.

“There were some good drugs in this drip, Ms. Goodwin, really.” the doctor smiles and nods towards the now-empty bag of fluids.

“Connor, we already have your blood.” Will says. “Is there some reason you don’t want us testing it?”

“Yes, there is. Like wasting time and resources, you know?” answers Rhodes clearly upset about the whole being-a-patient situation. He sounds bitter.

“Gentlemen.” warns them Ms. Goodwin.

“All right, last time. You want me to run some tests or you want to go outside and lose consciousness again in the middle of some street?”

“Will, you’re overreacting.”

“An answer, Dr. Rhodes.” Will says coldly. Connor just stares at him, challenging, but when Dr. Halstead doesn’t give up, the man just sighs and looks away. “Let’s order a CBC and we'll take it from there, all right?” Will asks, now softer.

“Okay.”

“Maggie?” Dr. Halstead calls to the woman and waits for her to look at him. “Full panel on him, please.”

“Sure. I’m gonna ask Joey. He can be, like, super-fast sometimes.” Dr. Rhodes hears her answer.

“It’s fascinating.” Ms. Goodwin says, looking at the two doctors in front of her. Those same two doctors that are supposed to hate each other and can argue for three hours straight over every single thing, but that can also apparently understand each other without any words and that clearly care about each other way more than they are able to admit. “You two interacting, I will never understand it.” the woman heads out of the treatment three. “Keep me updated.” she adds to Dr. Halstead and leaves.

Connor watches the woman walk away, and when she’s far enough he turns to Will with a guilty expression on his face. “I’m sorry, but you don’t have to worry, I really am fine.” he says and Halstead just exhales.

“Yeah, I know, it’s just- you-“

“Hey, it’s okay.”

“I watched your unconscious body collapse to the floor, Connor.” Will says and he puts one hand on his hip, lifts the other in a gesture he probably doesn’t understand himself. “It was just a second, and I was right there but I wasn’t fast enough to catch you. I was literally a step away-“

“Will, come on. Listen to me.” Connor cuts in, not wanting his boyfriend to talk himself into a panic attack. “You’re gonna get my results and you’re gonna see that I’m okay. It’s my own fault, I should’ve eaten something after my third surgery, but the family was all over me after they heard about complications and I thought I could get by. My blood sugar dropped and I fainted, but I’m gonna drink some orange juice, grab a snack, and you gave me a drip. I’m okay.”

“Yeah, okay.” Will says, sighing, and he walks closer to sitting on his bed Dr. Rhodes. He grabs his left hand and carefully removes the IV from his arm. Connor looks through the glass door and he sees that there’s a nurse at nurse’s station looking at them. He doesn’t recognise her so she’s either new or learning.

“I could kiss you right now, but there’s a nurse looking at us.” he says and Will laughs at that. It’s a beautiful sound. Will laughs in a beautiful way, Connor thinks. God, he’s a beautiful human being in general.

Will risks a look at the nurse’s station. “Yeah, Nurse Intern. She’s learning under Maggie. She’d tell her for some bonus points probably.” after removing the IV, the doctor takes his hands away from the surgeon and leaves an empty drip hanging, waiting for someone to clean it later.

“Maybe we should check how an on-call room is doing, then?” Connor suggests, he guesses on-call room should be empty.

“First cafeteria, you can be horny later.” quiets him Dr. Halstead so he groans in disappointment.

“You’re no fun.” he says, but then Will sends him a look so he lifts his hands in a gesture of surrender.

Dr. Rhodes stands up, not too quickly to not get dizzy again, and after fixing his scrubs he heads out of the ‘treatment three’ room. He looks into the ‘two’ to check how Justin is doing, but there’s another patient in there.

“Hey, what about JJ?” he turns back to Dr. Halstead.

“He was good to go, you were asleep for quite some time.”

“Hm?” the man really does feel fine. He didn’t think about it earlier, but now... he doesn’t think he was sleeping longer than half an hour. The fact that Justin is out, though, and Will’s comment... that mean he must’ve been unconscious for at least two hours. Because his blood sugar dropped, how long could it have been?

“Almost four hours.” answers Will, catching up to Connor and Connor’s eyes widen. He _just passed out._

“Seriously?” he asks, frowning as he walks into the direction of the doctors’ lounge.

“Seriously. That’s why I worry.” says Will quietly, because in the ED everyone can overhear you and if anyone overheard that Dr. Halstead worries about Dr. Rhodes and he admits that - and face to face to Dr. Rhodes - well, the two doctors would just announce that they are dating, because they would be the hottest ED-gossip either way.

“Dr. Rhodes, are you alright?” The Nurse Intern asks the surgeon when two doctors walk through the nurse’s station. Connor didn’t even have time to think of any answer to Will, so he just decides it’s better to drop it as he looks at the woman in front of him. She actually does look familiar, he must’ve seen her around, but he never worked with her.

“Yes, thank you.” he answers with small smile, because she seems genuinely worried about him. “Dr. Halstead fixed me up.” he gestures to Will standing next to him and he can’t help but notice how quiet it is in the ED right now. Although, he did sleep for almost four hours, he guesses it’s just that time in a day.

“You should eat something.” the intern nurse - Aria, her ID says - advises him. “And I have orange juice in my locker.”

Connor opens his mouth to kindly turn down her offer, but there’s suddenly Will’s palm grabbing his left forearm, so he looks up at the man standing to his left.

“We were just going to the Cafeteria.” Will smiles slightly at Aria, but there’s something else on his face. It’s a tight smile, not one of those genuine ones that take Connor’s breath away.

“Thank you, though.” Connor adds quickly, when the nurse’s smile falters. “I appreciate it.”

“Come on.” hurries him Will and they walk away from Aria. Will’s right palm still on Connor’s left forearm.

They walk into the doctors’ lounge and Connor goes to his locker while Will takes off his white coat. Connor just grabs his wallet and remembers that he had his phone on himself when he passed out, so he checks his pockets, but it isn’t there.

“Where’s my phone?” he asks, because his phone is also his pager and he _needs_ his pager like he needs air to breath.

“Here.” answers Will, checking his own pockets and pulling out two phones. He passes Connor the one that belongs to the surgeon and hides his own.

“You okay?” Connor asks, closing his locker, but keeping one eye on the Physician.

“Yeah, yeah.”

“Will.”

“I’m okay, why would not be okay?” the redhead looks like he wants to throw his hands up in the air and Connor tilts his head.

“Because you were just kinda mean to the nice Intern Nurse?”

“I was mean?” the doctor snorts, but Connor just looks at him and he breaths out, this time really throwing his hands up in frustration and he looks away before he answers. “She was hitting on you.”

“Wha-“ Connor starts, but he cuts himself. “I just passed out and she was being nice.” the man explains, because if Will is jealous then he’s not gonna mock him. He’s just gonna explain that there is nothing to be jealous about.

“She just offered you freaking orange juice, Connor.” Will deadpans, looking back at the surgeon and Rhodes has to fight the urge to snort at how ridiculous that sentence sounds.

“First of all, I’m sure she was just worried and-“

“I heard her talk about you about two weeks ago.” Will cuts in. “How smart you are, what a great surgeon you are, how you care about your patients, how hot you are-“ he lists with an over dramatic tone. “Oh, and we can’t forget that you know Spanish.” the doctors places his palm on his chest, but then his expression turns serious again. “I _know_ she was hitting on you, Connor.” he says, looking straight into the other man’s eyes.

“Well I don’t care about that.” Rhodes says quickly, because he remembers the beginning of their relationship and how unsure of himself Will was. “I have a great boyfriend who is really hot and smart himself and cares about his patients too and even though he’s not fluent in Spanish, he is so ambitious and passionate it makes him look even better than speaking any language would.”

Will bites the inside of his cheek to not grin too widely. “I know, I’m pretty awesome.” he shrugs nonchalantly. “It’s just, I don’t know. I had to listen to her drooling over you and then she even asked Monique if you’re single and it was so annoying.”

“I love you, Will.” Connor says and he curses at the stupid window-walls that he can’t walk to his boyfriend and touch him. “We know each other for about five years, we’re together for almost two years. It’s you and only you for me.” he looks into the man’s eyes to show him how serious and honest he is.

“I know.” Will takes a deep breath as he runs his fingers through his hair. “Love you too. But we should really get going to the Cafeteria or Maggie will notice me and will call for me.”

* * *

They are hiding in an on-call room. Sitting on one of the four beds, leaning on the wall behind them and their shoulders are touching.

Connor takes one last sip of his orange juice and he puts the bottle down on the floor next to the bed. Then, he leans against the wall again and he grabs Will’s right palm, holding it in his own two hands. Will leans against the wall himself and he has closed eyes, but Connor can see that the gesture makes him smile.

“Do you want to tell everyone about us?” the surgeon asks and Will opens his eyes, looking at him.

“Like, going to Goodwin and all that?”

“Yeah. I mean- at first we kept this quiet, because we weren’t sure if it was going to work out, but turns out we’re pretty great together.”

“That we are.” Will grins. “Are you sure, though?”

“Will, I’m crazy about you and I’m serious about us. If that’s something you want then I’m all in.” answers Connor and Will just looks at him.

“You’re amazing, did I tell you that?” the redhead breaths out, because he might have just fallen in love all over again.

“You might have mentioned something.” Connor laughs, still not letting go of Will’s hand.

“I think if I had some ring right now, I would propose to you.” Will says, not even registering the words and Connor breaths in. “That would be a bad idea though, right? It’s not exactly the most romantic place.” he adds to make it sound more like a joke than it actually is.

“That would be a bad idea, because I am the one who’s supposed to propose to you.” answers casually Connor and Will frowns.

“And when did we establish this?”

“We just did.” says the surgeon and he reaches for his boyfriend. He finally lets go of the other man’s hand, but then he places his palm on Will’s face, a thumb brushing over his cheekbone as he leans in and kisses the man. Will, of course, kisses back and his own hand automatically falls on Connor’s waist. He remembers that they are in the freaking hospital in the on-call room, though, so he stops himself from fixing his position and laying his other hand on the surgeon’s neck. Connor ends the kiss by biting Will’s Cupid’s bow and pulling away.

“Would you, though?” he asks when they get back to the casually-leaning-against-the-wall-shoulders-touching-totally-bros.

“Hm?”

“Would you marry me?”

Will laughs at that and he turns his head to look at the surgeon next to him. “I’ve got it bad for you ever since you gave me that stupid tie.” he says, smiling softly at the memory. “I was just like a little kid with a crush and instead of actually talking to you like a human being I was picking on you.” he laughs again. “Which you already know, because I told you that. Yes, I would absolutely marry you, Connor.”

“Okay.” the surgeon answers and he gets up quickly.

“Where are you-“ Will narrows his eyes.

“I’ll be back in a sec.” Connor says over his shoulder and he’s out of the room before Will can even think of an answer. Is he- No. Will is not going into overthinking shit right now. Connor is just Connor, he can run out of the room after hearing his boyfriend say that he would very much like to marry him one day. He’s stupid like that.

Instead of worrying about something he doesn’t have to worry about, Will finds the bottle of Connor’s juice and he takes a big sip. He doesn’t know what he wants the orange juice to do exactly, but at least it tastes good and in the meantime Connor did whatever he was supposed to do and he’s back. With flowers that he most likely just stole from someone or somewhere and he looks like he was running through the hallways and _he is not supposed to be running, he literally just an hour ago woke up from unconsciousness after he passed out._

“Connor, what the-“ Will begins, standing up from the bed, but he closes his mouth shut when he sees the idiot in front of him kneel on one knee and smile brightly.

“William Halstead-“ Connor begins and Will doesn’t know if - considering the circumstances - he should cry or laugh, so he settles on grinning just for now. “I stole these flowers from the ICU hallway, I think they were for the nurses so don’t grow attached, because we have to give them back.” the surgeon says and Will laughs at that. “I will buy you an engagement ring, but for now they have to do.” the man explains. “You are intelligent, you are passionate, you are motivated and ambitious, and caring, and absolutely sweet, and you can be arrogant and stubborn and impossible to deal with, but you are the love of my life and when you smile just like now my whole day brightens, so will you please say again that you will marry me?” Connor ends and there are some tears of joy threatening to fall from his eyes and Will is pretty sure his own eyes are glassy as well.

He pulls Connor up, so the man wouldn’t kneel on the floor any longer. “Yes.” he says and he quickly presses a kiss to the man’s lips. “I will marry you.” he presses another kiss, and then he laughs. “You better go and put these flowers back before anyone can notice them missing.”

“It can wait.” Connor answers, grinning. “I just got engaged.”

“Technically, though, I proposed first.” Will bickers, but to be honest he’s not lying and he did propose first and if it wasn’t for him then Connor wouldn’t get the idea.

“But I did it properly.”

“Oh, right, because you stole nurses’ flowers.”

“What can I say, I’m a romantic.” Connor says nonchalantly and Will cannot believe that this is how this day played out. From Connor passing out to them getting engaged in an on-call room.

“Maybe you should sit down, Mr. Romantic. You lost consciousness not so long ago.” Will takes those freaking flowers in a vase from his boyfr- his fiancé ( _wow, his fiancé_ ) and he places them on the one small table that is standing in this room.

“Will, I’m-“

“You’re fine. Yes, I know, but would it kill you to just sit down for my sake?” Halstead asks and Connor lifts his hands in a gesture of surrender and he walks to the same bed they were sitting on earlier and he does as he’s told.

“At least come join me.” says Connor as he reaches for Will with his left hand.

“The talk with Goodwin will be so much more scary right now.” the redhead says as he all but collapses on the bed and leans his head on Connor’s shoulder.

“At least Ms Goodwin will be easier than introducing you to my father.” Connor jokes, but it makes Will stiff, because yes! he didn’t meet Connor’s father yet! not officially at least! help!

“It’s not fair, because Jay and my dad know about us and they like you and I didn’t even meet your father.” Will hides his face in his hands as he thinks. “Ever.” This is gonna be a disaster.

“Claire knows about us, so she can help us out. It’s gonna be just fine.” Connor says soothingly, so Will takes a few deep breaths, grabs one of Connor’s hands with his own, closes his eyes and nods.

It’s gonna be just fine.

**Author's Note:**

> come yell at me on my tumblr: remi-briggs


End file.
